“I wish you were at home... You're so handsome!” five-year-old Asiye kisses the photo paper. She hardly ever parts with her father's portraits, which her mother had specially printed for her. The girl often asks why her parents can't live together like they used to.

Aziz and Adile have been married for six years but separated for half of them. All this time, Aziz has been in a Russian prison. Asiye is the Akhtemovs' first and so far only child.

On September 4, 2021, Aziz was detained by the FSB in his own home and accused of sabotage, storage, and smuggling of explosives as part of an organized group. His brother, former journalist of the Avdet newspaper Asan Akhtemov, and Deputy Chairman of the Mejlis of the Crimean Tatar people Nariman Celâl were arrested with him. Adile calls this day the darkest in her whole life. 

When the FSB officers began to check the Akhtemovs' phones and their laptop in the kitchen during the search, Adile and Aziz heard a child crying from the room. Little Asiye was only two years old at the time.

“I will never forget that moment,” Adile says, ”I asked to go to her and literally squeezed between strangers in masks to take Asiye in my arms and calm her down".

But at that moment, not only her daughter but also her husband needed support, so Adile returned to the kitchen and began to rock the baby to sleep. 

“I prayed for her to fall asleep, sat down on the floor, and started rocking Asiye in a hurry. I didn't want her to see the horror that was happening in our home that morning. In the house where she felt safe, surrounded by our love,” she recalls the search.

Now Adile corresponds with her husband by e-mail, telling him how Asiye is feeling, what she is interested in, and what her achievements are. During all this time, Aziz managed to call through the official prison connection only a few times. To talk to his daughter - only twice.

“Our daughter is shy. That's why as soon as Aziz started talking to her, she was silent, hiding behind me. Of course, he knows that she is like that and that she still loves him, but I can imagine how hard it is for him to see his own daughter ashamed of you,” says Adile Akhtemova.

When she thinks that no one sees her, Asiye talks to her father's photo. “I miss you very, very much,” the girl tells the portrait. - “I love you... to the moon!”

The last time Asiye saw her father was in 2021 in the FSB building. Aziz was allowed to see his family a few months after his arrest. Adile realized that this was a special meeting.

“He was very worried about how she would meet him, whether she would be afraid, whether she would let him take her in his arms. Luckily, once Asiye saw her father from the first minutes the door opened, she went to him with ease,” the political prisoner's wife recalls. ”I remember Aziz's happy smile when he hugged his daughter and played with her. I remember how Asiye began to be capricious, saying that she wanted to rest. And even in this small room, where not only Aziz was, but also other prisoners with their families, he sat down on two chairs and started rocking her on his legs. He was so happy that he could not only play with his child but also take care of her in a simple way.”

On October 12, it was the Akhtemovs' wedding anniversary, but Adile cannot send her husband a letter of congratulations because she again does not know where he is.

On September 3, 2024, he was transferred from a prison in the Krasnoyarsk Territory to an unknown destination. A month later, his wife received a letter from her husband, dated September 18. In it, he said that he was in SIZO-1 in the Krasnoyarsk Territory and that he would be there for about two weeks. Adile immediately wrote a letter to the detention center. However, after a while, she received a message that the addressee had “already left”. So the family does not know where Aziz is now and where he will eventually be transferred.

Aziz Akhtemov was born on May 14, 1996 in the village of Pervomaiskoye, Simferopol district of Crimea. His family was one of the first to return to the peninsula after the deportation. He graduated from the College of Radio Electronics, was engaged in the repair of electrical equipment, then, together with his partner, he opened a small car service in Simferopol, where he worked until his arrest.

On September 4, 2021, Asan Akhtemov was detained on trumped-up charges of blowing up a gas pipeline in the village of Perevalne. He was charged with the illegal purchase and smuggling of explosives, as well as sabotage committed by a group of people.

On September 21, 2022, the self-proclaimed Supreme Court of Crimea sentenced Akhtemov to 13 years in prison, a fine of 500 thousand rubles and restriction of freedom of movement for one year.

The Prosecutor's Office of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea and Sevastopol opened criminal cases against the occupiers for violating the inviolability of the defendants' homes and unlawful deprivation of their liberty. The agency called Akhtemov and Celâl, as well as other Crimean residents, “hostages of the occupation regime”. The Russian human rights organization Memorial recognized Aziz Akhtemov as a political prisoner. 

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